by NIKOS RAPTIS
“Top secret State Department memoranda…show clearly that the future of Greek economic development lay exclusively in the hands of the American planners… Dated August 4, 1949, the subject of one memorandum was ‘Capital Investment in Greece for Economic Development’… Parts of the conversation [in the memorandum] are highly illuminating. George C. McGhee, the Coordinator of Aid to Greece and Turkey, remarked that ‘it would be necessary to bear constantly in mind the political consequences of negative decisions on Greek industrial development projects. It might be desirable to reduce the doses of American aid to Greece, so that the standard of living would gradually be brought down to a level which the economy of the country could support. However, this process would have to be carried out gradually and very carefully to avoid violent or unfavorable political reaction in Greece. It would have to be accompanied by some plan for large scale emigration…’
Further along in the memorandum, still another astonishing remark by another State Department official appeared: ‘Mr., Dort commented that Greece will achieve economic viability at some level, and we do have to decide what that level will be.’ ” (Memorandum 868.6463/8-449, N.A., pages 2 and 3. Theodore C. Kariotis, Journal of the Hellenic Diaspora, Vol. VI, No. 4, Winter 1979, p.91, 92). [Again, obviously, emphasis was added]
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